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Top-level
@evolvable @jonw @jan @davidho However, for street lighting, as opposed to slow charging from one's residential installation, there are costly complications: 1. Street lighting circuits are usually un-metered. Adding meters is a costly investment with under-powered results. When you charge from home this is already taken care of, since your private installations are billed. 1/4 3 comments
@evolvable @jonw @jan @davidho 3. Slow charge at home may be OK, but if all the cars along a busy row-house street attempt it at the same time, it becomes unfeasible. Again, the circuits feeding homes are larger and can usually cope with night-time simultaneous charging, but street lighting circuits would struggle in most areas where the spatial need makes the idea attractive. 3/4 @evolvable @jonw @jan @davidho 4. There are safety issues regarding the earthing (grounding) and protection offered by street lighting circuits. In the UK they cap individual loads on these circuits to 2KW (9Amsp) to get around that cheaply. If you want to connect bigger loads, then you'll need to invest in compliant earthing, which may make the concept unfeasible. Once all of those issues are addressed, the whole concept withers on the vine due to costs. 4/4 |
Gregory's Server
@evolvable @jonw @jan @davidho
2. Street lighting was already efficient before LEDs. Most street lamps are/were one of the discharge gas variants. They are slow to start but in the same range as LEDs for efficiency. It's not really the case that there is untapped capacity in these circuits.
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